Because I don’t want this to be one of those long winded, ‘oh my God get to the point’ blogs, I’ll cut to the chase.
Sometimes ... things just go over my head., It creates that audible whistle as it flies just above the head.
Dante was here again tonight. No he doesn’t work with me all the time. Sometimes he works in the morning, and it’s better for him to come in at night. He usually sets up a rollaway bed in the laundry room out of camera’s eyes, pops a few quarters in the dryer for white noise and goes to sleep. Sometime intoxicated, sometimes not.
I was in the back and he was behind the front desk. When I returned I saw a guest walking away. I told Dante I would have handled it, he wasn’t on the clock, and he said,. “No, it’s fine. They were complaining how they couldn’t sleep last night because of the smell of weed, but I told them that guest is gone.”
“Who?” I asked.
“132.”
“Oh, the pimp.”
Okay, so let me see if the writer in me can describe this accurately. The moment I said they word ‘pimp’ Dante had this reaction. His eyes widened, his hands shot up as if to cover his ears and his whole body went into this nervous shudder.
“Jackie!” he scolded. “We don’t say that word.”
“What word? Pimp?”
“Uh!” He dramatically he cringed, crinkling up every part of his face. “Stop. That is offensive.”
“Wait. Wait.” I laughed. “Offensive. You’re saying pimp ..”
“Uh! Quit that before someone hears.”
“Pimp?”
“If you say it again, I am gonna have to write you up.”
‘Seriously? What is so wrong with that word.”
“It’s not PC.”
“And a .... pimp deserves PC?’
“Jackie!” he blasted. “Thar is an ugly word. My kids will never grow up knowing that word.”
Let’s recall Dante’s five kids are ones he sponsors through Save the Children.
“They aren’t really your kids.”
As if he were Joan Crawford, his voice dropped an octave and in his ‘Mommy Dearest Voice’ blasted. “How dare you. They are mine. I write letters. I’m going to see them in a couple years and believe you me, if I wasn’t their sponsor they wouldn’t be around.”
“Oh my God. Okay, Okay, I’m sorry. And I’m sorry I said the ‘P’ word. What should I have called him?”
“A manager, an agent, anything but that.”
I stifled a laugh, because he was totally serious about it. I gave him some quarters for the dryer and he went off to the guest laundry to sleep.
Cut to two hours later. It’s around two-thirty, I did some writing and my conversation with Dante was far from my mind. It should not have been,
TamTam who lives here, comes in and walks to the desk. She asked if I had any body spray or perfume. To which I told her our manager, Nancy had an entire collection that she keeps when people leave them behind. After selecting the lavender, she doused herself, sighed out, and walked to the door.
“Leaving again?” I asked. “It’s late.”
“Yeah. I know. I have get back to work.”
“Wow, late hours.”
“You’ll have that. I’m a working girl.”
Okay, stop, did you hear that? That subtle whistle grazing against my scalp as Captain Obvious sails over my head? Yeah, I didn’t hear it.
“Yep I hear you,” I said. “Me, too.”
She stopped. “Really? You’re a working girl. Where do you work out of?”
“My home mainly.”
“Lucky you.”
“Sometimes. But sometimes it gets tough. I mean, the grandkids running in and out of the room.”
“That would be tough. Where do you get your business from?” She asked.
“The internet. Mainly Amazon.”
“Really? Amazon. I had no idea.”
I nodded. “Working out of home can be crazy, that’s why I took this job. I can get work done here.”
“Do they know?” She asked.
“Oh, sure, Nancy is fine with it. I told her, if laundry is done, I am doing my own work. So I sort of do double duty when I’m here.”
“That’s is so smart.” She said. “You work with anyone?”
I shook my head and told her I work alone. She made a comment that it wasn’t safe and I agreed. Giving her the cliff notes version of how someone tried to kill me.
So I get back to work and another couple hours goes by, just before morning coffee rush, TamTam returns with a guy. I kid you not, he calls himself Tommy Luv, “With a ‘U’” he said, “For you.”
He then proceeded to tell me that TamTam told him about me.
“This is my area. You really should call me. I can offer you protection,” said Tommy.
“Aw, you are so sweet,” I replied. “Thank you.”
Tommy mentioned how Tam told him about someone trying to kill me.
“That was scary,” I said. “I called the police, they didn’t do anything. They didn’t believe me.”
“Did you think they would?” He asked. “Not when you’re working. Look, you work out of your home that’s fine. But around here you need to talk me. Let me represent you.”
“You mean like an...” the second the word ‘Agent’ slipped from my lips. The bell and light went off in my head.
Ding.
Okay so I may not always get things, but when I do, I can be quick on my feet to think. Hurriedly, I tried to cover, I didn’t want to back track and say I wasn’t a ‘working girl’, so I simply said. “You know what? I totally misunderstood what you meant. I have someone that represents me. My agent.” I winked.
“In this area?” Tommy asked. “Who?”
After a brief paused, I smiled and said. “Dante.”
“Dante that works here?” TamTam asked.
I nodded. They seemed to accept that answer and they walked to the elevator.
Not really sure if they’ll approach Dante when he’s on shift tomorrow, but I’m sure he’ll handle it just fine.